That had been Athaclena’s idea. Fiben wasn’t sure he liked it, but oddly enough, it was one Tymbrimi suggestion Gailet had taken up wholeheartedly. An anthropologist’s gambit. Fiben sniffed.

He rode over to a copse of willows by a stream not far from the Embassy grounds, near the fence and the small, whirling watchers. He stopped the engine and got off. Walking to the edge of the stream, he took several long strides and leapt up onto the trunk of a tree. Fiben clambered to a convenient branch, where he could look out onto the compound. He took out a bag of peanuts and began to crack them one at a time.

The nearest watcher disk seemed to pause briefly. No doubt it had already scanned him with everything from X-rays to radar. Of course it found him unarmed and harmless. Every day for the last week a different chim had taken his lunch break here at about this time of day.

Fiben recalled the evening at the Ape’s Grape. Perhaps Athaclena and Gailet had a point, he thought. If the birds try to condition us, why can’t we turn the tables and do it to the birds?

His phone rang again.

“Yeah?”

“Uh, I’m afraid Donal’s suffering from a little flatulence. He may not be able to make it to the picnic.”

“Aw, too bad,” he muttered, and put the phone away. So far, so good. He cracked another peanut. The D-17 had been put into the pipes delivering hydrogen to the Embassy. It would still be several minutes before anything could be expected to happen.

It was a simple idea, even if he had his doubts. The sabotage was supposed to look like an accident, and it had to be timed so that Gailet’s unarmed contingent was in position. This raid was meant not so much to do harm as to create a disturbance. Both Gailet and Athaclena wanted information on Gubru emergency procedures.

Fiben was to be the general’s eyes and ears.

Over on the grounds he saw avians come and go from the chancery and other buildings. The little blue light atop the Diplomatic Cache winked against the bright sea clouds. A Gubru floater hummed overhead and began to settle toward the broad Embassy lawn. Fiben watched with interest, waiting for the excitement to begin.

D-17 was a powerful corrosive when left in contact with town-gas hydrogen for long. It would soon eat through the pipes. Then, when exposed to air, it would have yet another effect.

It would stink to high heaven.

He didn’t have long to wait.

Fiben smiled as the first squawks of consternation began to emanate from the chancery. Within moments the doors and windows burst forth with feathered explosions as aliens boiled out of the building, chirping in panic or disgust. Fiben wasn’t sure which and he didn’t really care. He was too busy laughing.

This part had been his idea. He broke a peanut and tossed it up to catch in his mouth. This was better than baseball!

Gubru scattered in all directions, leaping from upper balconies even without antigravity gear. Several writhed on broken limbs.

So much the better. Of course this wasn’t going to be much of an inconvenience to the enemy, and it could only be done once. The real purpose was to watch how the Gubru dealt with an emergency.

Sirens began to wail. Fiben glanced at his watch. A full two minutes had passed since the first signs of commotion. That meant the alarm was given manually. The vaunted Galactic defense computers weren’t omniscient then. They weren’t equipped to respond to a bad smell.

The watch buoys rose from the fence together, giving off a threatening whine, whirling faster than before. Fiben brushed peanut shells from his lap and sat up slowly, watching the deadly things warily. If they were programmed to extend the defense perimeter automatically, whatever the emergency, he could be in trouble.

But they merely spun, shining with increased vigilance. It took three more minutes, by Fiben’s watch, for a triple sonic boom to announce the arrival of fighter craft, sleek arrows resembling sparrow hawks, which streaked in to pass low over the now empty chancery building. The Gubru on the lawn seemed too nervous to take much cheer in their arrival. They leapt and squawked as sonic booms shook trees and feathers alike.

A Gubru official strutted about the grounds, chirping soothingly, calming its subordinates. Fiben didn’t dare lift his monocular with the protector-drones at such high alert, but he peered to try to get a better view of the avian in charge. Several features seemed odd about this Gubru. Its white plumage, for instance, looked more luminous, more lustrous than the others’. It also wore a band of black fabric around its throat.

A few minutes later a utility craft arrived and hovered until enough chattering avians had stepped aside to give it room to land. From the grounded floater a pair of invaders emerged wearing ornate, crested breathing masks. They bowed to the official, then strode up the steps and into the building.

Obviously the Gubru in charge realized that the stench from the corroded gas pipes posed no threat. All the noise and commotion was doing much more harm to his command of clerks and planners than the bad smell. No doubt he was upset because the work day was ruined.

More minutes passed. Fiben watched a convoy of ground vehicles arrive, sirens wailing, sending the agitated civil servants into a tizzy again. The senior Gubru flapped its arms until the racket finally cut off. Then the aristocrat waved a curt gesture at the supersonic fighters hovering overhead.

The warcraft swiveled about at once and departed as swiftly as they had come. Shock waves again rattled windows and sent the chancery staff shrieking.

“Excitable lot, aren’t they?” Fiben observed. No doubt Gubru soldiery were better conditioned for this sort of thing.

Fiben stood up on his branch and looked over toward other areas of the park. Elsewhere the fence was lined with chims, and more streamed in from the city. They kept a respectful distance back from the barrier guardians, but still they came, babbling to each other in excitement.

Here and there among them were Gailet Jones’s observers, timing and jotting down every alien response.

“Almost the first thing the Gubru will read about, when they study Library tapes on your species,” Athaclena had told him, “will be the so-called ‘monkey reflex’… the tendency of you anthropoids to scurry toward commotion, out of curiosity.

“Conservative species find it strange, and this tendency of humans and chims will seem particularly bizarre to avian beings, which tend to lack even a semblance of a sense of humor.”

She had smiled.

“We will get them used to this type of behavior, until they grow to expect those strange Earthling clients always running toward trouble… just to watch.

“They will learn not to fear you, but they should… speaking as one monkey to another.”

Fiben had known what she meant, that Tymbrimi were like humans and chims in this way. Her confidence had filled him, as well — until he saw her frown suddenly -and speak to herself, quickly and softly, apparently forgetting that he understood Galactic Seven.

“Monkeys… one monkey to another… Sumbaturalli! Must I constantly think in metaphors?”

It had perplexed Fiben. Fortunately, he did not have to understand Athaclena, only know that she could ask anything she wanted of him and he would jump.

After a while more maintenance workers arrived in ground vehicles, this time including a number of chims wearing uniforms of the City Gas Department. By the time they entered the chancery, the Gubru bureaucrats on the lawn had settled into the shade just outside, chirping irritably at the still potent stench.

Fiben didn’t blame them. The wind had shifted his way. His nose wrinkled in disgust.

Well, that’s that. We cost them an afternoon’s work, and maybe we learned something. Time to go home and assess the results.